Cave Ridge & Guye Peak Snowshoe

If you remember my post from a month ago, we went snowshoeing and were trying to find the Guye Peak trail but were a bit confused. This past weekend we went snowshoeing with our friend Tom and decided just to park at Snoqualmie and head out into Commonwealth Basin and see where the day took us. There are a multitude of trails winding through the basin and we didn't have a particular agenda, so just kept to the left.

It was a beautiful sunny day, and the views were spectacular thanks to the fresh snow coating everything. There was at foot of new snow on the ground, only lightly packed on the trail.

After a couple hours we saw ahead what every snowshoer dreads - people breaking the trail you were on. Ok, that was dramatic, it's not really dreaded but it often means those ahead aren't on a particular trail (and therefore may not be going anywhere interesting/with a view) and it always means that you are going to catch up to them and have to start breaking trail yourself. Which is hard work. But we're tough (hah) so we just laughed at ourselves and kept going.

We caught up to the group of four guys at the top of the ridge and after some friendly greetings they asked 'where are you headed?' Matt and Tom looked at each other sheepishly and I laughed and asked them where we were. They in turn laughed at us, the snowshoers who not only didn't know where they were going, but where they even where (the thing with snowshoeing is, as long as there's not blizzard, you can always follow your trail back). They pointed out Snoqualmie Mountain one direction from the ridge and low and behold, Guye Peak the other direction. Snoqualmie Mountain looked big, so we headed for Guye Peak. It's a clifflike rock face on three sides, but there's a ridge along the back (that's climbable, though Class 4 in the summer and steep in the winter). Taking care for avalanches and cornices we picked our way to the top.

The views were fantastic - probably my favorite snowshoe so far. After a snack we turned down and were back in the city for NYE.

2011 In Review

When I ‘did the numbers’ for 2010 travel this time last year, I said if I never had another year like it til I retired, I’d be ok. And it truly was a pretty amazing year. While I didn’t quite beat 2010 by the numbers this year, we came pretty darn close. More importantly we spent tons of quality time with friends, and were blessed by the ability to travel and spend time with some of those who don’t live near to us. Here’s to 2012 being just as fulfilling!

6 Countries (5 new ones!)

5 States

5 trips to Canada

48 days out of the country

3 very special weddings, and visits from all 3 of my favorite Germans

Ok, not so much backpacking but…
20 days of hiking

A mere
110,000 frequent flyer miles used each (with about 200k each in waiting for next year)

1 finished basement!

Cheers!

December Snowventures - Source Lake/Snow Lake Snowshoeing & Crystal Mountrian Snowboarding

Our first weekend truly home we decided to get out of the house to enjoy some of the copious snow Washington had been receiving earlier, find some sunshine, and hang with our buds Devon & Noah.

Alpental parking lot

Our plan was to head up to Guye Peak & Cave Ridge, and we started off in the Alpental parking lot with some directions. After searching high and low, we couldn't find any trail heading in the direction indicated and decided to do something we knew. (We later found out that was the summer route we were trying to find and that the winter route started completely elsewhere). After the initial frustration, we turned off to Snow Lake, the snowshoers highway. It was a sunny day and we did see plenty of people, but nothing too horrible.

D&K

We had all been to Snow Lake at least once before, but mostly not in the snow. At one point we realized we had missed the turnoff, but not knowing where we missed it decided to continue on since we knew Source Lake had to be close. After a brief stop there (too many people, everyone missed the turnoff) we turned back and found the trail we had missed before! Close to the ridge we hit a pretty steep spot. We started up it , but ended up turning around before the final pitch, having realized we were going to have a hard time getting down and that the trail down to the lake on the other side was likely to be similar. Should have brought those ice axes (how many times have I said that?)

Steep.

Glissading

Oops

and these ones I stole from D...

So, in summary, we arrived exactly nowhere, but found some powder and glissade tracks on our way down and were completely satisfied with our sun soaked snow experience. That's what the outdoors is all about.

The day after Christmas Matt & I both had the day off and after not receiving any snow for a  few weeks Crystal had received 9 inches of new snow on Christmas. It was a perfect morning, and while things had gotten a little crusty by the afternoon we had some great views and excellent runs. We're hoping to get up a lot more often this year than the past few!

Cheers!

Details, Details - Vietnam

At the end of Turkey I decided to do this for each trip, here's truly the last Vietnam post: "I decided to start doing a post at the end of the trip that had links and mini-reviews to the places we stayed and other services we used. Sometimes people ask me about places or are planning a trip themselves and I can't remember or find where I put the info. Now it's all right here. I'm going to try to go back and do the same for some of our older trips as well. Scoot on by for today if you're not interested in the details."

 

 

Everywhere we stayed was between $9-$30 (mostly in the low 20's). They were all private rooms with their own functional but not fancy bathrooms, and most included a pretty extensive breakfast.

Transportation
We flew Japan Airlines for all our international flights (with our British Airways frequent flier miles) and loved the airline.
We flew Jetstar Pacific from Da Nang (Hoi An) to HCMC. It was roughly $30 and they were very basic, but just fine.
We flew Vietnam Airlines from HCMC to Phu Quoc Island & back. They were less basic, though nothing fancy. Roughy $100 all in for the round trip ticket.

Within cities we mostly took taxi's with prenegotiated very reasonable rates everywhere except Phu Quoc & Saigon, where there were reasonable metered taxi's. Our longest were a few 30-45 minute airport trips and even those were only ~15.

I don't know who our Ha Long Bay boat or overnight bus companies were, but I wouldn't recommend them! Pay a little more for those things...it's worth it.

Motorbikes (scooters) can be rented around every corner all over the country and usually range from $5-$10/day.


Lodging & Food (Particularly good restaraurants noted if they actually had names)

Hanoi
Stayed at Hanoi Charming Hotel. I wouldn't recommend buying any tours or tickets here (a bit expensive) but otherwise great. Nice clean room, even came with a computer. Breakfast was good. The staff 'made' Matt sit down to eat dinner with them and fed him 'tiger meat'. Pretty sure it was something unmentionable, but we'll leave that to your imagination.

Cat Ba
Stayed at Duc Tuan Hotel. They totally gave our room away to a tour group. They tried to stick us some other place, but I called her bluff and we ended up with a ($9) non-ocean view room one day and then had to move our stuff to an ocean view room ($14). The ocean view room was great. Very very little English spoken - but really not a lot of great options on the island. Two doors towards the center was the best mango pancakes of the trip. Would recommend I guess, given the options.
Hoi An
Stayed at Hai Au Hotel. Staff was insanely friendly, polite, and helpful. Breakfast was outstanding. A bit far from the center, but not a problem if you get a motorbike. Definitely recommend.
Eat: Ba le Well & Citronella. (Details in our Hoi An post). Both awesome!
Do: Heaven & Earth Bicycle Tours was one of the highlights. Try to get Lan as a guide!

Phu Quoc: Stayed at Beach Club. Accomadations were great, awesome beach location and lounge chairs. Food overpriced, eat down the beach: the walk is nice, tastes better, costs half as much, and the $1.50 rum is on the way. Staff mediocre, but the owner was out of town, so I'll give them the benefit of the doubt. Hard to find a cheap but nice place right on the water on the island, so would definitely recommend.
Eat: The night market in town was one of the highlights. Do it more than once if you can. The food at the town on the north tip of the peninsula (there's only one restaurant there) was the best of the trip - don't know that the place has a name though. Don't think we paid more than $10 for the two of us for a seafood filled meals w/ beer while on the island.

Do: Before deciding to scuba dive we did some vigorous research, and ended up heartily agreeing with all the great reviews of Rainbow Divers. Friendly, well trained staff, no more than 3 divers per divemaster, and a great lunch.

Saigon: Stayed at Green Suites Hotel. Nice room, friendly staff, decent location. Would recommend. And the place next door let us shower for free the night we flew out. Score. We had some good sushi in the shopping district but..can't remember the name.

Do: Our guide Vu for the Mekong Delta was great. He doesn't have a website, but hit me up with a comment and I'll send you his info.